DAVID THEWLIS as Remus Lupin and DANIEL RADCLIFFE as Harry Potter in Warner Bros. Pictures' fantasy "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix."PHOTOGRAPHS TO BE USED SOLELY FOR ADVERTISING, PROMOTION, PUBLICITY OR REVIEWS OF THIS SPECIFIC MOTION PICTURE AND TO REMAIN THE PROPERTY OF THE STUDIO. NOT FOR SALE OR REDISTRIBUTION.

REVIEW

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix: Fantasy adventure. Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint and Ralph Fiennes. Directed by David Yates. (PG-13. 138 minutes. At Bay Area theaters.)

Passionate fans of the "Harry Potter" series will find things to enjoy in "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix." But others, naive types stumbling in just hoping to see a movie that stands on its own, will find a long picture with a few pleasing moments, one standout performance and a lot of unnecessary plot loops. It all depends on the perspective: Taken as a motion picture, the new "Harry" comes up short. But taken as a visual aid to the experience of reading a book, the new "Harry" does its job.

The picture benefits from the time-lapse photographic maturation of Daniel Radcliffe, who now has the capacity to bring a sophisticated internal life to young Harry. This is a character who suffers a lot inside, and when he was a child, Radcliffe could only simulate that. Now he can take it in, feel it and show it. He has been growing, while Emma Watson, as his friend Hermione, can now give Jessica Alba a run for her money -- that is, in the can't-say-two-sentences-without-sounding-false department.

Let's accentuate the positive for a moment. Any movie that has Michael Gambon (Dumbledore) walking around with a napkin ring in his beard can't be all bad. The same could be said for any movie that has Ralph Fiennes (Lord Voldemort) looking like he just got back from seeing Michael Jackson's plastic surgeon. Anyone who appreciates British villains will take pleasure not only in Fiennes but in Jason Isaacs, as his ice-cold functionary Lucius, and Alan Rickman as Snape. Actually, Rickman plays a good guy, but fortunately it seems that someone forgot to tell him.

The best villain of all is the villainess, Dolores Umbridge, a mole from the ministry, who is sent to the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry with the intention of weakening the training. As Dolores, Imelda Staunton gives the performance to take from the movie, presenting her as a study in happy self-delusion. She is someone who is convinced of her own kindness when she's vindictive, convinced that she's sincere when she's a liar, and convinced of her grandeur of spirit when she's petty and mean. Dressed like Jackie Kennedy in Dallas, Staunton goes through the movie in a flutter of self-satisfaction and succeeds in being simultaneously hilarious, utterly recognizable as a type and thoroughly hateful. They don't give Oscars for movies like this, but Staunton is as good or better here than she was in "Vera Drake," in which she was nominated for a best actress Oscar.

Also in this movie's favor are its visuals, which are often more than just realistic presentations of the impossible (we take that for granted by now), but artistically and aesthetically rendered. A flight across the Thames at night on broomsticks is a beautiful thing to see. A similar flight, later in the film, on thestrals is almost equally satisfying. Likewise, the movie takes pains to present, in amusing detail, the hustle and bustle of a ministry building, depicted as a kind of magical version of Grand Central Terminal -- lots of crowds, with everyone in a hurry and everyone taking the magic for granted.

With such distractions, who would even notice that "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" has a story that's just plain lousy? Unfortunately, that's impossible not to notice. Here's just one example, but a good one to give in that it happens in the first 20 minutes. Harry uses his magic powers outside school, and for this infraction of Hogwarts' regulations, he is threatened with expulsion. He goes up before the court. He makes his case ... and the court doesn't expel him. Thus, the movie takes 20 minutes to leave Harry exactly where he was. In other words, those are 20 minutes no one needed to see. And there are similar plot loops, there either to replicate the book or to lengthen the film to junior-epic dimensions.

The story here is quite obscure and small-scale. The ministry is worried that Hogwarts presents a security risk, and so it prevents it from pursuing military-like training, not realizing that Lord Voldemort is back and preparing for an attack. But does he attack? "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" begins with a lot of wheel spinning, and it ends before anything really happens. In between you get lots of scenes of people pointing wands and of computer-graphic sparkles coming out of them. Over and over, sticks and sparks. Excuse me if I don't break into a verse of "That's Entertainment."

With this installment, the intention to make a discrete movie of every "Harry Potter" book suddenly seems misguided -- justifiable only financially, not artistically. The truth is, there's a really good one-hour movie here, but you'll have to blast through 138 minutes to find it.